Part 31 (1/2)
Yes, well. A relations.h.i.+p with a morally upstanding Dutchman with a taste for p.o.r.nography and adultery was bound to come with a dizzying level of complications and arcane rules. Emmanuel glanced around the room and took note of the hastily made bed and the dust motes dancing over the painted concrete floor. It seemed that Willem got all the neatness he needed at home and then came to this room to wallow in the mess.
”Did you visit Pretorius at the stone hut?” he asked. The stone hut that was kept as fastidiously clean as the locked study in the immaculate Cape Dutch house but without the help of a maid.
”Yes, I did.”
”When you'd finished calling him Captain Pretorius and then Willem, did you clean for him?”
She looked up, gray eyes sparking with indignation. ”I'm not a maid,” she said.
No, she wasn't a maid and not overly fussy about housekeeping on the whole. Somebody had cleaned the stone hut to a hospital-ward level of cleanliness. The only thing missing was the astringent smell of pine antiseptic. ”Was the captain fussy about the interior of the hut? You know, did he have a place for everything and everything in its place?”
”No. He didn't care so much about keeping neat.”
”Not in this room and not at the hut,” Emmanuel said. In every other respect Willem Pretorius had kept himself very neat indeed. The immaculate white house with his immaculate white wife, the starched police uniform and spotless unders.h.i.+rts were all outside indications of his clean and spotless soul. Flip a coin and you got the shadow Willem, slumming naked in an unmade bed with a smile on his face. Why was the stone hut so clean? The captain hadn't been expecting any visitors.
”What were you doing at the hut?” Emmanuel asked.
”Getting the photos.” She was nervous now, her shoulders straightening as she pulled herself out of her slouch. ”I didn't want anyone to find them.”
”Did your mother clean up the hut, Davida?”
”No.”
”What did your father think about your relations.h.i.+p with Captain Pretorius? Did he approve?”
That threw her and she cupped a hand to her flushed cheek. ”What are you talking about? My father died when I was a child. In a farm accident.”
”I thought Willem Pretorius arranged for a bride-price to be paid to your father in exchange for you.”
”Wh-what? Where did you get that from? That's a lie.”
”Which lie are we talking about? The one about the bride-price or the one about your father being dead?”
Davida quickly hid her fear and confusion in her shy-brown-mouse persona. ”I told you the truth about Captain Pretorius and myself. I even told you what we were doing when he got shot. Why would I lie to you now, Detective Sergeant Cooper?”
”I don't know.” He noted the correct use of his t.i.tle. ”But I'm sure you have your reasons.”
He walked to the door, conscious of Shabalala waiting outside and of the gathering speed of the investigation. He had to make the connection between the molester and the captain's killer real enough to stand up in court. He needed evidence.
”Are you going to take me to the station?” she said.
”No.”
The Security Branch and the Pretorius brothers were the last people he'd expose her to. She was safe so long as she remained an anonymous coloured woman working for an old Jew in a shabby local store. Once she'd been revealed as Captain Willem Pretorius's doxy, the knives were going to come out and the punishment for her transgressions would be fierce.
”What do I do now?” She sounded lost now that everything about her secret life had been exposed.
”Stay here. You can help your granny in the garden but don't leave the property until I get back and tell you it's okay to move around.”
”When will that be?”
”I don't know.” He pulled the door halfway open, then stopped. ”What happened back in April?”
”How do you know about that?”
”I don't. That's why I'm asking.”
She hesitated, then said, ”I had a miscarriage. Dr. Zweigman made sure everything was cleaned up and healed, but the captain thought he killed the baby. They had a fight about it. I never talked about Dr. Zweigman with the captain after that and I never talked about the captain with Dr. Zweigman, but we all knew.”
”I'm sorry,” Emmanuel said, and stepped out of the room and into the garden. He was sorry to have ever heard of Jacob's Rest. He was also sorry to discover that the disconnect switch, the one that allowed him to endure the grisliest murder investigations without getting emotionally involved, no longer worked.
17.
CRUSHED GUM LEAVES...” Emmanuel said to the mechanic after he and Shabalala had made their way back to the garage. ”What do you use on your hands that has that particular smell?” Emmanuel said to the mechanic after he and Shabalala had made their way back to the garage. ”What do you use on your hands that has that particular smell?”
Anton rummaged in a wooden bucket and pulled out a tin can stamped with an impression of a slender leaf with jagged thunderbolts spiking out from it. ”Degreaser. Us mechanics use it to clean up. It gets the dirt up from around the nails and between the fingers.”
”Who would use this particular cleaner?” Emmanuel pried open the top and sniffed the thick white slurry. The gum leaf smell was intense. ”Just mechanics, or anyone fixing machinery?”
”Well, it's not cheap, so it wouldn't be used by someone fiddling around with their bicycle or bore pump. The only other place I've seen this stuff in town is at the Pretorius garage.”
”Is that where you get your supply?”
Anton laughed. ”Good heavens! Can you imagine Erich Pretorius letting me buy anything from his place? No, I get my little sister to bring back two or three cans when she comes home from Mooihoek for the holidays. She's at boarding school there. She was only down this weekend because of the funeral.”
”You'd notice if a can was missing?”
”Definitely. I string my supply out over the year. Like I said, it's expensive. December's supply has got to last to Easter, then I have to stretch the next one to August.”
”December and August?” Emmanuel gave the can of precious cleaner back to Anton and pulled out his notebook. Something was nudging his memory. ”Why those months in particular?”
”School holidays,” Shabalala said. ”My youngest son comes home also at these times.”
The molester was active during two distinct periods: August and December. Emmanuel gave his notes a quick check. That was right. He checked specific dates with Anton. The attacks occurred during the holidays and at no other time of year. The attacker might be partial to schoolgirls. Or on school holidays himself.
”Gentlemen.” Zweigman appeared holding a container of his wife's b.u.t.ter cookies as an entree into the conversation. ”My wife will be upset if I do not deliver these as promised.”
”The molester? What made you think it was a white man?” Emmanuel asked.
”I have no proof. Just a feeling that the color of his skin is the reason why he was not caught and brought to trial.”
”Okay.” Emmanuel included all three men in the conversation. ”Let's a.s.sume the molester was a Dutchman. Are there any white men that you know of who are only here in town for the big school holidays?”
Zweigman, Anton, and Shabalala all shook their heads in the negative. Emmanuel moved on. ”Which white boys were at boarding school last year? I'm talking about boys over the age of fourteen.”